Two solo shows by Korean artists who will make the most of the work-in-progress of the space which will eventually become the Hanmi Gallery:
HANMI GALLERY INTERIM EXHIBITION
20 May – 05 June 2011
Situated Senses 01 : Inclined Angles
HANMI GALLERY is pleased to present the interim exhibition ‘ Situated Senses 01: Inclined Angles’ before the official opening of the gallery. For your information, the gallery site is currently under construction and its opening is planned for January 2012.
Situated Senses introduces contemporary artists who focus on the theme of space, in particular site-specificity. They present experimental form of artwork closely related to the specific feature of a space which is differentiated from the typical form of exhibit spaces.
Situated Senses presents two prominent contemporary Korean artists, Shan Hur and Soon-Hak Kwon. Hur and Kwon have created a unique situation in a void space where its original use was far removed from the traditional meaning of exhibit spaces.
The space was built to be a design office in the 1980s and there are plans to transform it into a gallery space (HANMI GALLERY) in the near future. In the meantime, the plan is to use this space for artistic trials and experimentations by talented young artists. In this way, the empty space becomes a laboratory and the artists become practitioners.
Exhibition Dates : 20 May – 05 June 2011
Opening Hours : Monday – Friday 10AM-6PM, Saturday – Sunday 11AM – 6PM
Private View : Friday 20 May 6 – 8PM
Curated by Jay Jungin Hwang (Independent Curator)
Installation by Shan Hur
The project unfolds with two distinct solo exhibitions. Each artist shows the coexistence and collision of contradictory states in the spaces of daily life (Shan Hur) and the interrelationship between a sense of distance and space originating from the psychology of visual experience (Soon-Hak Kwon). The works’ outgrowth was generated from a penetrating observation about the space during the preparation for the exhibition.
Hur has constructed two huge installation works which embody the site-specificity by deploying pre-existing construction materials and the structure of the space. Hur has created a slightly slanted angle from the wooden floor of the space and achieved a delicate situation by building subtle distinctions with the unstable floor. While Hur concentrates on the structure of the space and the uniqueness buried in everyday life, Kwon deals with the history of the space which covers a narrative meaning of site-specificity. Kwon has created two double-layered spaces by installing hyper-real photographic images on the walls. These images are closely related to the past and the future of the space in which the works will be displayed. With regard to the concept of the works, Kwon developed his idea based on the contextualization of the past (as a design office in the 1980s) and the space’s future uses (as a gallery space) and produced coexisting states of different time tenses in the same place. Overlapping situations in a perspective, these spaces delude viewers within the illusionary space.
Installation by Soon-Hak Kwon
To particularise the space, each artist has created inclined angles between the walls and the artworks, which are intentionally distorted to arouse a sense of strangeness and curiosity. The inclined angles, which are created and disguised by both artists’ creative senses, are the point where artistic senses are most prominent. The artists address their visual identities raised by the site, and those hidden senses can be ascertained by the viewers’ faculties of observation and perception. This is reminiscent of Robert Morris’ concise statement on the relationship between art and its situation within: ‘Art is primarily a situation in which one assumes an attitude of reacting to some of one’s awareness as art.’ Unwittingly encountering the ways in which each artist created specific situations by articulating spatial relations, viewers might come to realise the meaning of site-specificity and identify its crucial role in the two artists’ works, both consciously and unconsciously.
Situated Senses does not seek to present works of art in spaces. It rather finds the ultimate meaning of existence or raison d’être, as a situational artwork and its concept derived from a consideration of the place. This project will continue to develop its experimental movement to arouse viewers’ latent senses that situates within their inner world, and to touch viewers’ daily lives through active participations of their movement in the space, which is occupied by the artists’ existing senses.
Artists Information Shan Hur (b.1980) graduated from Seoul National University with B.F.A in sculpture and Slade School of Fine Art with M.F.A in sculpture. He had one solo exhibition and participated in several group exhibitions in London. He won 1st prize in ‘The Open West (Gloucestershire, UK, 2011)’ and was awarded in ‘Brighton University Art faculty Prize (UK, 2007).’ He works and lives in London.
Soon-Hak Kwon (b.1979) graduated from University of Incheon College of Fine Arts with B.F.A in painting, Hongik University with M.F.A in photography and Royal College of Art with MA in photography. He had four solo exhibitions and participated in several group exhibitions in Seoul, London, and Paris. He won gold prize in ‘29th Competition of Chang-Jark Arts’ Association (Korea, 2004)’, a prize for ‘Selected Artist’ in ‘28th Joong-Ang Fine Arts Prize (Korea, 2006).’ He works and lives in London.
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